Brand Positioning Case Study - Cherry Black Accountants
Cherry Black
Case Study.
An established accounting
firm entering its next generation.
Cherry Black is a Perth accounting and business advisory firm built around practical advice, straightforward relationships and helping clients make better financial decisions.
We've worked with Cherry Black for more than a decade, helping build and evolve the brand as the business has grown.
But businesses change.
And Cherry Black had changed significantly.
With a new partnership structure bringing Paul, Brad and Nick together, the business had entered a new chapter. The original brand foundation was still strong, but it no longer quite reflected the firm they had become.
The opportunity wasn't to throw away everything that had been built.
It was to bring the brand up to date with the reality of the business.
The Challenge.
How do you evolve a brand without losing
everything that made it work?
Cherry Black had always deliberately positioned itself away from the traditional accounting firm.
That helped create a distinctive personality and gave the business a strong point of difference.
But over time, the language and positioning had started to feel like they belonged to an earlier version of the business.
The partnership had changed.
The leadership had changed.
The business had matured.
And the brand needed to reflect that.
The challenge was to find a new position that felt contemporary and confident without trying to make Cherry Black something it wasn't.
Not a creative agency.
Not a quirky accounting firm.
Not a business trying too hard to be different.
Simply a very good accounting firm, with experienced people who know their clients, understand business and can give trusted advice.
The Uncovery.
We didn't start again.
We started with what was already there.
After more than a decade working with Cherry Black, we already understood the history of the brand.
So this wasn't about starting from a blank page.
It was about looking at what had changed.
The original brand had been built around being different to accountants. The new partnership needed something more grounded in who they actually were.
The conversations became less about how Cherry Black wanted to appear and more about how Paul, Brad and Nick naturally thought, spoke and advised.
That uncovered a much simpler and stronger direction.
Less marketing.
More trusted adviser.
Less telling people that Cherry Black cares.
More demonstrating what that care actually means through advice, clarity and experience
What We Heard.
The new Cherry Black didn't need more personality.
It needed more confidence.
The strongest shift was in the way the partners naturally communicated.
Rather than:
"We care."
"We're passionate."
"We believe..."
The new Cherry Black sounded more like:
"Here's the situation."
"Here's what it means."
"Here's what we'd recommend."
That change might seem subtle.
But strategically, it was significant.
It moved Cherry Black away from talking about what an accounting firm should be and towards showing clients what an experienced adviser actually does.
The brand became simpler.
More direct.
More confident.
And much more reflective of the three partners themselves. The brand refresh identified the new personality as confident, practical, approachable, dependable and local.
What We Uncovered.
Cherry Black wasn't selling accounting.
It was selling confidence.
People don't really buy tax returns.
They buy certainty.
They want to understand what's happening.
They want to know what their numbers mean.
They want someone who can see what's coming and help them make the right decision.
That became the heart of the new positioning.
Cherry Black helps businesses and individuals make better financial decisions, remove uncertainty and plan for what's next.
The shift was from talking about the services an accountant provides to understanding the outcome clients are actually looking for.
As we put it in the original brand work:
They buy confidence.
The Brand Opportunity.
From being different to accountants to
being better at being accountants.
The opportunity wasn't to abandon the original Cherry Black personality.
It was to mature it.
The new brand could be confident without being corporate.
Professional without being formal.
Approachable without being casual.
Experienced without needing to constantly say so.
And most importantly, it could put the three partners at the centre of the story.
Three partners.
Three different strengths.
One trusted firm.
That felt like a much more authentic story for the Cherry Black of today.
The Position.
Advice that keeps you moving forward.
"Move forward" became the underlying strategic idea.
Not as a forced tagline, but as a simple thought that could connect the whole brand.
Making better financial decisions starts here.
Helping businesses move forward.
Planning for what's next.
Advice that keeps you moving forward.
Building stronger financial futures.
It gave Cherry Black a contemporary, professional and quietly confident position that felt appropriate for the new partnership
and, importantly, gave the website and ongoing communication a clear direction.
Bringing it to life.
The new website became the first expression of
the new Cherry Black.
With the strategic direction established, we translated the thinking into a completely refreshed digital experience.
The new website needed to feel like the firm itself.
Clear.
Professional.
Approachable.
Confident.
And easy to understand.
Rather than leading with accounting jargon or simply listing services, the new site focuses on the people, the advice and the decisions Cherry Black helps clients make.
The result is a more contemporary expression of an established business - one that respects the brand's history while clearly signalling where the partnership is heading.
The Work.
Evolving the brand and bringing
it into the next chapter.
The work included:
- Brand Positioning
- Brand Refresh
- Brand Direction
- Messaging Strategy
- Website Strategy
- Website Copywriting
- Website Design
- Website Development
- Digital Experience
- SEO
The website is now live, with The Jam Jar continuing to work with Cherry Black on ongoing SEO and helping the brand continue to build visibility in-market.
This isn't a one-off rebrand.
It's the next stage of a relationship we've been building for more than a decade.
The Result.
A brand that feels more like
the business it has become.
Cherry Black didn't need to become something completely new.
It needed to become a clearer version of itself.
The new positioning gives Paul, Brad and Nick a stronger foundation for the next chapter of the firm - one that reflects their experience, their different strengths and the confidence clients place in their advice.
The new website now brings that thinking into the digital experience, creating a clearer, more contemporary expression of Cherry Black and the people behind it.
And because the relationship continues, the brand doesn't stop at launch.
The next chapter is about continuing to build visibility, relevance and growth through ongoing SEO and digital activity.
The Jam Jar's Perspective.
Sometimes the best brand work is knowing what not to change.
We've worked with Cherry Black for more than a decade.
That history matters.
Because when you've been close to a business for that long, you don't need to reinvent it for the sake of it.
You can see what has always worked.
You can see what has changed.
And you can help the business make the connection between the two.
For Cherry Black, the opportunity wasn't to create a new personality.
It was to give the business it had become a brand that finally sounded like it.
The business had evolved. The brand needed to catch up.
Services.
A clearer story for an evolving community.
Brand Positioning
Brand Refresh
Brand Direction
Messaging Strategy
Website Strategy
Website Copywriting
Website Design
Website Development
Digital Experience
SEO
Portrait Photography
The right thinking makes everything else work harder.
We uncover what makes your business different, then turn that thinking into brands, ideas and experiences that have a reason to exist.
Because clarity comes first. Creativity follows.